


A Burning

by olivemartini



Series: A Study in Sherlock [8]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, The Pool Scene, missing moment, post season one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 12:22:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15219068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olivemartini/pseuds/olivemartini
Summary: I've disappointed you, Sherlock said, but that was before, before the pool and Moriarty and a bomb strapped to John's chest, before Sherlock began to understand what it might feel like to lose.





	A Burning

_I've disappointed you,_ he had said, earlier, but that before.

Before the pool, with Moriarty standing in front of him and telling him that he had a heart as much as he liked people to believe that he didn't ( _and wasn't it easier that way?_ ) and that he was going to burn it out of him, burn it all to cinders.

Before John, who walked in with a bomb strapped to his chest, John blinking out a warning in Morse code because he knew that Sherlock would see ( _better than see- understand.  so many people see but don't know, not really_ ), John who offered to give himself so Sherlock could go free, John who sank into him when Moriarty walked away, which was nice, but did make getting the bomb off of him a bit more complicated.

Before the explosion, before the gun in Sherlock's hands and the silent agreement that they would pay the price for taking this bastard down, even if he and John went with him,  before that desperate plunge into the pool with the heat blistering at the their backs and before Sherlock swims to John beneath the water, holds him down until it is safe and then drags him up, coughing, spluttering, cursing.

Before the night after, where John made him sit at the table and peeled off his soaking, smoldering clothing and made sure that every inch of his aching back was soothed, all the singed skin numbed and his bruises iced, before even thinking of himself.

"You care about me," is what is happening now, with the two of them standing in the living room.  Sherlock isn't sure why, other than John had informed him that Sherlock hadn't noticed that he had left,  _again,_ and Sherlock had waved it away with his usual line of  _I'm a sociopath, what do you expect,_ and John had just shook his head.  "You care about me and sociopaths can't do that, not really."

"High functioning," he whispers, not sure why he is protesting, because surely this is better, better to be friends and to care about him freely.  ( _Better, but not safer.  Better, but with more capacity to hurt, later on down the road._ )

"Don't give me that.  I've seen you.  The real you."  John doesn't make a move to come closer, which is good, because Sherlock probably would have ran away.  "You care about people.  About your brother.  About Mrs. Hudson.  Me.  Even Lestrade."

"I don't."  Sherlock spluttered.  It was the first time he had been caught off guard by anything, not because it was unfamiliar territory, but because it was a dangerous one, one that normally found him as the punchline of some joke he didn't get or sitting at a lunch table at home or clutching his coat alone in the cold without any way to tell what he had done to offend.  "I don't even know Lestrade's first name."

He did.  It was Greg.  It was just more fun to pretend not to, though he did delete it those first few weeks.

"You care about people.  You would burn the whole world down for them, you just proved it last week."  Last week- pool, fear, heat, John, John, John.  "Burn the whole world down for me.  That's what he meant, wasn't it, about your heart?  He meant me."

 _He meant the work,_ is Sherlock's protest, quickly followed by  _not just you,_ but none of them make it past his lips.  "He won't hurt you."  Sherlock felt his hands ball into fists and he shook it out, not used to the anger, not this unbridled, churning thing that he felt burning in his chest, like he was constantly on the verge of losing control  That was for other people more human, more accustomed to the idea of being weak.  "Not for as long as I live."

"That's not what I was worried about."  John was just as quiet as he would.  "That wasn't the point."

"Then what is the point?"

"That we're in this together."   _That you love me,_ should be the next sentence, and half of Sherlock wants it to be, but John is too kind to do so.  "That there's no point in pretending that you can't be hurt around me."

"I'm not pretending." Sherlock is spluttering again.  "This isn't some sort of charade."

"Yes,"  John says, calm, and for the first time, Sherlock wishes that he had been matched with some other room mate, one that would not have wanted to come to that crime scene with him and who left after the first container of eyeballs he found in his fridge and wasn't willing to put a bullet through someone's shoulder ( _the exact place he had got hit, deadly but with a chance to survive, not like a head shot, maybe subconscious or maybe an attempt to leaving it up to God, who knows_ ), because then he would not feel like the ground is falling out from beneath his feet.  "It is, isn't it?"

 

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on Instagram @olive.writes.fanfic


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